Saudi Arabia, the Clinton Foundation and Those Massive Yemen Bombs

Massive bunker buster bomb with radioactive particle spread to camera. It is theorized by analysts that this is a small nuclear bunker buster, also known as an Deep Earth-Penetrating Weapon (EPW) the initial blast is the first stage blasting the surface layer and second blast (a few second later is the main charge detonating deep under the ground. Online paid trolls have been constantly stating that this was a ammo facility that was hit. They provide no evidence of such and and also fail to explain the radioactive particle dispersion in front of the camera lenses of multiple cameras

(Sanaa) – Saudi Arabia-led coalition airstrikes using United States-supplied bombs killed at least 97 civilians, including 25 children, in northwestern Yemen on March 15, 2016, Human Rights Watch said today. The two strikes, on a crowded market in the village of Mastaba that may have also killed about 10 Houthi fighters, caused indiscriminate or foreseeably disproportionate loss of civilian life, in violation of the laws of war. Such unlawful attacks when carried out deliberately or recklessly are war crimes.

Human Rights Watch conducted on-site investigations on March 28, and found remnants at the market of a GBU-31 satellite-guided bomb, which consists of a US-supplied MK-84 2,000-pound bomb mated with a JDAM satellite guidance kit, also US-supplied. A team of journalists from ITV, a British news channel, visited the site on March 26, and found remnants of an MK-84 bomb paired with a Paveway laser guidance kit. Human Rights Watch reviewed the journalists’ photographs and footage of these fragments.

“One of the deadliest strikes against civilians in Yemen’s year-long war involved US-supplied weapons, illustrating tragically why countries should stop selling arms to Saudi Arabia,” said Priyanka Motaparthy, emergencies researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The US and other coalition allies should send a clear message to Saudi Arabia that they want no part in unlawful killings of civilians.”

New Report of U.S.-Made Cluster Bomb Use by Saudis in Yemen

Human Rights Watch released a report Sunday providing new indications that Saudi Arabia has fired American-made cluster munitions, banned by international treaty, in civilian areas of Yemen, and said their use may also violate United States law.

The report included photographs from Yemen purporting to show unexploded but potentially lethal remnants of American cluster weapons, suggesting that they had failed legally required reliability standards.

Published on May 25, 2015
Note radioactive dispersion of particles to camera from mini-nuke

Life is not good for human beings in Yemen. Saudi Arabia is killing civilians and bombing family gatherings and hospitals with US supplied bombs and military hardware

Saudi Arabia has engaged in war crimes, and the United States is aiding and abetting them by providing the Saudis with military assistance. In September 2015, Saudi aircraft killed 135 wedding celebrants in Yemen. The airstrikes have killed 2,800 civilians, including 500 children. Human Rights Watch charges that these bombings “have indiscriminately killed and injured civilians.”

This conflict is part of a regional power struggle between Iran and Saudi Arabia. The Saudis are bombing Yemen in order to defeat the Houthi rebels, who have been resisting government repression for a long time. Iran has been accused of supporting the Houthis, although Iran denies this. Yemen is strategically located on a narrow waterway that links the Gulf of Aden with the Red Sea. Much of the world’s oil passes through this waterway.

A United Nations panel of experts concluded in October 2015 that the Saudi-led coalition had committed “grave violations” of civilians’ human rights. They include indiscriminate attacks; targeting markets, a camp for displaced Yemenis, and humanitarian aid warehouses; and intentionally preventing the delivery of humanitarian assistance. The panel was also concerned that the coalition considered civilian neighborhoods, including Marra and Sadah, as legitimate strike zones. The International Committee of the Red Cross documented 100 attacks on hospitals.

Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions prohibits the targeting of civilians. It provides that parties to a conflict “shall at all times distinguish between the civilian population and combatants and between civilian objects and military objectives and accordingly shall direct their operations only against military objectives.”

In January 2016, the Saudi government executed 47 people, including a prominent pacifist Shia cleric, who had been a leader of the 2011 Arab Spring in Saudi Arabia. Most were beheaded. This horrifies us when ISIS does it. Yet State Department spokesman John Kirby protested weakly, “We believe that diplomatic engagement and direct conversations remain essential in working through differences.”

The Saudi Arabia lobby in the United States is a collection of lawyers, public relation firms and professional lobbyists paid directly by the government of Saudi Arabia to lobby the public and government of the United States on behalf of the interests of the government of Saudi Arabia.

An article by journalist John R. MacArthur in Harper’s Magazine details “The Vast Power of the Saudi Lobby”. According to MacArthur,

The long and corrupt history of American-Saudi relations centers around the kingdom’s vast reserves of easily extractable oil, of course. Ever since President Franklin D. Roosevelt met aboard ship in 1945 with King Ibn Saud, the special relationship with the desert kingdom has only grown stronger. The House of Saud is usually happy to sell us oil at a consistent and reasonable price and then increase production if unseemly market forces drive the world price of a barrel too high for U.S. consumers. In exchange we arm the Saudis to the teeth and turn a blind eye to their medieval approach to crime and punishment.

According to Seymour Hersh the power of Prince Bandar and the Saudi lobby was so great that Bandar effectively joined the Bush administration as a virtual member of the cabinet.

George Washington University Professor Hossein Askari blames the “power of the Saudi lobby in Washington” for the failure of the American government to defend the democracy protesters in Bahrain in 2011. According to Askari, “our marriage to the Al-Sauds threatens our (American) national security.”

Role of Bandar bin Sultan

In the assessment of The Economist, “No Arab ambassador—perhaps no ambassador—has come close to matching Prince Bandar’s influence in the American capital. At the height of his powers he was indispensable to both sides: in Mr Ottaway’s words, “at once the king’s exclusive messenger and the White House’s errand boy”. The Prince’s “feats” of lobbying legerdemain included securing the purchase of AWACS surveillance aircraft in the teeth of fierce Israeli and congressional opposition, and augmenting his influence with the Reagan administration by quietly supplying $32m to the Contras in Nicaragua and $10m to anti-communist politicians in Italy.

Following the money

In the first decade of the 21st century the Saudis paid approximately $100 million to American firms to lobby the American government.

Major lobbying firms that work as lobbyists in the pay of the Saudi government include Hill & Knowlton, which has been employed to lobby for Saudi Arabia since 1982. Qorvis Communications has worked for Saudi Arabia since the 9/11 attacks, receiving over $60.3 million over the course of a decade.Hogan Lovells U.S., L.L.P., formerly Hogan & Harston, worked for Saudi Arabia in 2009. The Loeffler Group, LLP, headed by former Congressman Tom Loeffler of Texas, was paid $10.5 million by the Saudi government during the first decade of the century, and gave Sandler Innocenzi, Inc. $8.9 million. Patton Boggs, LLP, earned over $3 million from Saudi Arabia for lobbying in the first decade of the century.

The Middle East Policy Council has received large payments from Saudi Arabia to lobby for the Kingdom, including $1 million in 2007.

A partial list of firms that have been paid by Saudi Arabia to lobby the American government includes:

In September alone, foreign lobbying disclosure documents show the Saudi government signing deals with PR powerhouse Edelman and lobbying leviathan the Podesta Group, according to recent disclosures.

Edelman, the largest privately owned public relations agency in the world, is known for helping clients win favorable media coverage on mainstream outlets. The Podesta Group is a lobbying firm founded by Tony Podesta, a major fundraiser for the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign.

The new signings are the latest in a year-long hiring spree by the Persian Gulf state as it further builds up its already formidable political arsenal inside the Beltway. The Saudi Arabian Royal Embassy did not respond to a request for comment.

In March, the Saudi Royal Embassy retained two influential lobbying firms, DLA Piper and Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman. DLA Piper, for instance, employs a small army of former government officials, including retired U.S. Sens. Saxby Chambliss and George Mitchell. Also in March, the embassy retained two firms that specialize in analyzing big data for political clients, Targeted Victory and Zignal Labs.

Saudi Arabia’s political operation already includes former Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn., who chairs one of the largest Republican Super PACs in the country, as well as the public relations firm MSLGROUP/Qorvis, and Saudi Aramco, the state-owned oil company that funds several influential American political groups, including the American Petroleum Institute. Aramco’s U.S. subsidiary, Saudi Refining, is a registered agent of the Saudi government. The government also finances a number of think tanks and universities, and has made contributions to prominent American nonprofits, including the Clinton Foundation.

The Podesta Group contract is with the Center for Studies and Media Affairs at the Saudi Royal Court. The contract, filed in the Justice Department’s foreign lobbying database, says that the firm will provide “public relations” work for the center.

Mini-nuke/possible MOAB with radioactive elements

Link to website that examines the probability that US supplied mini-nukes were used in Yemen in 2015.

Excerpt: On paper, the Clinton Foundation looks unimpeachable: a charitable organization dedicated to improving millions of lives through education and health.
However, it remains mired in suspicions about conflicts of interest involving the Democratic candidate for the White House.

Three months before the US presidential election, Hillary Clinton’s opponents accuse her almost daily of having used her influence as secretary of state in 2009-2013 for the benefit of the foundation her husband and former president, Bill, founded in 2001.

Unsurprisingly, accusations against the Clinton Foundation have focused on the financing of an organization whose resources have soared by almost 475 percent in a decade to exceed $337 million, according to its internal audits.

Its generous donor contributions — $217 million in 2014 — have prompted controversy, especially those from foreign governments: Saudi Arabia ($10 to $25 million), Kuwait (up to $10 million), Qatar and the United Arab Emirates (up to $5 million), according to the foundation’s figures.

Charity has received funds from governments of U.A.E., Saudi Arabia, Oman and Canada, among others

The foundation had agreed to stop raising money from foreign governments in 2009, after Mrs. Clinton became secretary of state. That step was in deference to Obama administration concerns about the propriety of taking money from other nations while Mrs. Clinton served as America’s top diplomat.
Mrs. Clinton left the State Department in early 2013, and the foundation later dropped the ban.

The United Arab Emirates, a first-time donor, gave between $1 million and $5 million, 2014 according to disclosures on an online Clinton Foundation database. Saudi Arabia, a previous donor, has given between $10 million and $25 million since the foundation’s creation. An unspecified portion of the money came in 2014.

Qatar’s government committee preparing for the 2022 soccer World Cup gave between $250,000 and $500,000 in 2014. Qatar’s government had previously donated between $1 million and $5 million.

Oman, which had made a donation previously, gave an undisclosed amount in 2014. Over time, Oman has given the foundation between $1 million and $5 million. Prior to last year, its donations fell in the same range.

Prince Turki al-Faisal, a former ambassador to the U.S. and member of the Saudi royal family who has attended annual meetings of the Clinton Global Initiative, made donations in 2013 and 2014, though exact dates aren’t available. Prince Turki met Bill Clinton decades ago when both were students at Georgetown University’s foreign-service school. Prince Turki’s chief of staff didn’t respond to emails seeking comment.

Another donor, Sheikh Mohammed H. Al Amoudi, an Ethiopian immigrant to Saudi Arabia, has donated between $5 million and $10 million, including while Mrs. Clinton served in the State Department. Mr. Al Amoudi has built an empire of construction, agricultural and energy companies across Saudi Arabia and Ethiopia.

Also giving money was Victor Dahdaleh, a London businessman whose foundation contributed between $1 million and $5 million, has ties to Bahrain’s state-owned aluminum company. He was the intermediary between the state-owned Aluminum Bahrain B.S.C. and Alcoa World Alumina, which is majority owned by Alcoa Inc. Last year, he was acquitted in London on charges of bribing Bahraini officials to secure contracts for the Alcoa firm. In the U.S., the Alcoa affiliate pleaded guilty last year to corruption charges, and the Justice Department said an investigation into the matter remains open.

The website of Friends of Saudi Arabia, a group listed as a million-dollar donor to the Clinton Foundation, is also down. But according to the U.S.-Saudi Arabia Information Service:

Friends of Saudi Arabia is an apolitical, secular, educational, non-profit organization that serves to build bridges of goodwill and understanding between Saudi Arabia and the international community.

Events hosted by Friends of Saudi Arabia serve as a tool for nurturing dialogue, debate, alliance building and networking opportunities between people of diverse backgrounds with hopes to dispel misconceptions, establish friendships, and inspire global understanding and exchange. Friends of Saudi Arabia aims to promote better “people to people” understanding as well as bridging social and cultural gaps.

In what may be the pinnacle of hypocrisy, moments ago Hillary Clinton, while speaking live on national security and addressing the Orlando shooting took some time from her constant bashing of the Second Amendment and calling for a ban on assault rifles, to say some less than kind words about Saudi Arabia whom it accused of supporting radical organizations. This is what she said:

The third area that demands attention is preventing radicalization and countering efforts by ISIS and other international terrorist networks to recruit in the United States and Europe. For starters, it is long past time for the Saudis, the Qataris and the Kuwaitis and others to stop their citizens from funding extremist organizations. And they should stop supporting radical schools and mosques around the world that have set too many young people on a path towards extremism. We also have to use all our capabilities to counter jihadist propaganda online. This is something that I spend a lot of time on at the State Department.

There is nothing wrong with that statement, as it is the whole truth – Saudi Arabia’s involvement in supporting terrorism stretches from Sept 11 all the way through to ISIS – however, where there is a big, and potentially law-breaking, problem is what Jordan’s official news agency, Petra News Agency, reported on Sunday citing the Saudi crown price, namely that Saudi Arabia is a major funder of Hillary Clinton’s campaign to become the next president of the United States.

As MEE notes, the Petra News Agency published on Sunday what it described as exclusive comments from Saudi Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman which included a claim that Riyadh has provided 20 percent of the total funding to the prospective Democratic candidate’s campaign.

The report was later deleted and the news agency has not responded to requests for comment from Middle East Eye. However, the deletion took place too late, as the Washington-based Institute for Gulf Affairs managed to capture the report and has re-published the original Arabic Petra report, which quoted Prince Mohammed as having said Saudi Arabia had provided with “full enthusiasm” an undisclosed amount of money to Clinton.

The US State Department has approved the sale of $1.29 billion (Ј848.6m) worth of bombs to Saudi Arabia, as its military carries out air strikes in neighbouring Yemen.

President Obama pledged to bolster military support for Saudi Arabia after tensions were strained following a US-brokered nuclear deal with Iran.
The sale, if it is not blocked by the US congress, “will replenish the Royal Saudi Air Force’s (RSAF) current inventory, augmenting Saudi Arabia’s capability,” a State Department spokesman said.

The Pentagon announced on Monday that the U.S. has approved a $1.29 billion arms sale to Saudi Arabia, despite widespread mounting evidence of the country’s mass atrocities and possible war crimes in neighboring Yemen.

The U.S. State Department on Friday approved the sale of over 10,000 bombs, munitions, and weapons parts produced by Boeing and Raytheon. This includes 5,200 Paveway II “laser guided” and 12,000 “general purpose” bombs. “Bunker Busters,” also included in the deal, are designed to destroy concrete structures.

“The proposed sale augments Saudi Arabia’s capability to meet current and future threats from potential adversaries during combat operations,” the Defense Security Cooperation Agency, which is part of the U.S. Department of Defense, said in an announcement of the deal released Monday.

But Raed Jarrar, government relations manager for the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), told Common Dreams: “Sending additional weapons to the Middle East will not stabilize the region or put an end to violence and extremism. Supporting proxy wars, interventions, and military occupations will only add fuel to the fire.”

“It’s also illegal under U.S. and international law to transfer weapons to human rights abusers, or to forces that will likely use it to commit gross violations of human rights,” Jarrar continued. “There is documented evidence that such abuses have been committed by almost all of U.S. allies in the region.”

The U.S. statement indicates that the deal will, in part, be used to replenish arms for Saudi Arabia’s seven-month-long military assault on Yemen, which has killed at least 2,355 civilians and wounded 4,862, according to United Nations statistics.

The Obama administration is seeking a go-ahead from Congress to sell up to $60 billion worth of sophisticated warplanes to Saudi Arabia and could add another $30 billion worth of naval arms in a deal designed to counter the rise of Iran as a regional power.

The deal would apparently represent the largest single U.S. arms sale ever approved. It would allow Saudi Arabia, the most militarily advanced of the Arab Gulf states and one of the richest countries in the world, to buy top-line U.S.-made helicopters and fighter jets with ranges that would span the Middle East and beyond.

Unlike some previous sales to Saudi Arabia, this one is not expected to be derailed by opposition in Congress or from U.S. backers of Israel, who have worried in the past about blunting Israel’s military edge over its Arab neighbors.

That’s more than half of the regular DoD procurement budget in 2010 and a number equal to the entire defense budget of the UK for this year (adjusted roughly to USD).

A coalition of Arab states led by Saudi Arabia is fighting alongside al-Qaeda militants against Houthi rebels in Yemen, according to a report. A BBC documentary crew has filmed jihadists and pro-government militiamen fighting rebels near the southern city of Taiz, supported by UAE soldiers.

It is unclear if the two groups are working together to coordinate their assault on the city, which lies 160 miles (260km) south of the capital Sana’a. Saudi Arabia has been leading a coalition of nine Arab states in a bombing campaign against Shia-dominated Houthi forces loyal to former Yemeni president Ali Abdullah Saleh since March 2015.

In late-2015, documentary maker Safa AlAhmad filmed members of Ansar al-Sharia, an affiliate of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), attacking Houthi fighters on a key hilltop near Taiz, with pro-government troops nearby. She was reportedly told by the militants to stop filming them and that they were angered by the presence of a woman.

According to a report from the Yemeni media network “Al-Jabhah News”, the Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham (ISIS) has been fighting alongside the Saudi-led Coalition and their mercenaries against the Houthi forces and Yemeni Army in the provincial capital of the Ta’iz Governorate.

ISIS and Al-Qaeda reportedly have a small presence inside the provincial capital; however, they can only be seen fighting against the Yemeni Army’s Republican Guard and their popular committees (including the Houthis).
The bodies of dead Houthi and Yemeni Army soldiers have been videotaped by the terrorist group being dragged in the streets of Ta’iz; this has been the extent of their propaganda in the provincial capital.

A Yemeni news agency “Al-Jabhah News” reported that in Yemen’s Taiz Governorate ISIS terrorists are fighting alongside the Saudi-led Coalition against the Yemeni Army and Houthi forces.

The news agency also reported that there are a small presence of ISIS and Al-Qaeda inside Taiz Governorate where those terrorists groups have been only fighting against the Yemeni army and Houthis popular committees.

According to a photo published by the news agency, two dead bodies of Houthis and Yemeni army soldiers were dragged on the street of Ta’iz by a Toyota van that belongs to ISIS terrorists. It is also reported that terrorist groups videotaped the gruesome act and distributed in social media to create terror propaganda against the Yemeni defending forces.
Hospitals bombed by Saudi Arabia

MSF’s medical activities in Yemen have been bombed four times in less than three months, with two hospitals, a clinic and an ambulance coming under fire. The organization is seeking guarantees from the warring parties that medical activities will be protected according to international humanitarian law.

“The way war is being waged in Yemen shows that the warring parties do not recognize or respect the protected status of hospitals and medical facilities,” said Raquel Ayora, MSF director of operations. “It is causing enormous suffering for people trapped in conflict zones. Public places are being bombed and shelled on a massive scale. Not even hospitals are being spared, even though medical facilities are explicitly protected by international humanitarian law.”http://

SANA’A, YEMEN, JANUARY 10, 2016—A hospital in northern Yemen supported by the international medical humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) was hit by a projectile this morning, killing four people, wounding 10 and causing the collapse of several buildings of the medical facility.

Three of the injured are MSF staff members, two of whom are in critical condition.
According to MSF staff members on the ground, at 9:20 a.m. one projectile struck the Shiara Hospital in Razeh district, where MSF has been working since November 2015. MSF cannot confirm the origin of the attack, but planes were seen flying over the facility at the time. At least one more projectile fell near the hospital.

The number of casualties could rise as there could still be people trapped in the rubble. All staff and patients have evacuated and patients are being transferred to Al Goumoury hospital in Saada, also supported by MSF.

“All warring parties, including the Saudi-led coalition, are regularly informed of the GPS coordinates of the medical sites where MSF works, and we are in constant dialogue with them to ensure that they understand the severity of the humanitarian consequences of the conflict and the need to respect the provision of medical services,” said Raquel Ayora, MSF director of operations.

“There is no way that anyone with the capacity to carry out an airstrike or launch a rocket would not have known that the Shiara Hospital was a functioning health facility providing critical services and supported by MSF. We reiterate to all parties to the conflict that patients and medical facilities must be respected and that bombing hospitals is a violation of international humanitarian law.”